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"This." Filcher says quietly as he puts the piece of paper down on the desk.
"This." Filcher says quietly as he puts the piece of paper down on the desk. "Was not what I asked for." "That's what we got." Elaine Milton says. "Lucy Fortune Connolly is being taken care of at Sunbeam Sanctuary: Home for Foster Children." "No." Filcher says. "She is not. I know that she WAS there not more than two days ago. I know that she is NOT there TODAY. I have just COME from Sunbeam Sanctuary. There are many children there, she is NOT among them." Elaine Milton's ice cold face tilted slightly. Then she sat down in her chair, and Filcher did the same in the one opposite from her. "I'll probably get the forms stating her move, and new location first thing in the morning." She sighed and her face sagged. "Normally I'm only doing this when I need to hide children and spouses from overly aggressive parents. This is the first time that it's been done for me." She rubs her temples. "How's her mother doing?" "Not well." Filcher says. "She's sitting in a very comfortable 'room.' Honestly, I've seen hotel rooms that weren't as nice. She mostly just sits and holds onto the rabbit toy that her girl gave her. It's the fact that she's alone, really alone, for the first time in ages that's hitting her so hard." He shakes his head. "I tried to visit her, to inform her of what's going on...but I think she'd rather face the loneliness than my offending presence." "Why'd you take such an interest in her?" The woman asked. "One cold professional to another." Filcher smirked. "As a form of respect form one devout worshipper of The Law and The City, to another...I'm not entirely sure." He shrugged. "A lot of reasons, but I think I know the main one. "I walked away from them, the Tribe, and they turned their backs on me, spit on me, and consider me to be the lowest of the low. Worse now that I'm part of Authority, and everything a Glass Knife shouldn't be. Now, the Tribe is helpless, and they need someone to watch out for them, keep the riots down, and making sure that people don't just disappear. They need me...and I'm not turning my back on them. That makes me the better person." "Does it?" "Probably not, and they'll continue to see me as a utter prat." Filcher says. "Not like both statements can't be true at the same time. It helps me sleep at night, at least, and that's valuable." Elaine nodded. She knew the feeling. You had to become Cold in these jobs. If you wanted to be able to help at all, and not end up broken yourself. Still, you needed those bulwarks of Warmth and Humanity or else you'd lose a lot more than just sleep. "If you're willing to wait, I can start shaking some trees and making pointed inquiries." Elaine said. Filcher shook his head. "No. As long as you let me know where she is the moment They let you know. They know we'd kick up too much fuss if she vanished, and we'd be the first to know. Anyway, I have another riot to quell, and a strike to talk down, and..." He sighed. "The list goes on." "They're keeping you busy. Huh?" Elaine said. Filcher nodded. "It's how they keep me under control, by letting me fix the side-effects of their Grand Plans." He shook his head. "Just as they delay you by stalling and then burying you in paperwork." "His Lordship is quite clever." "Ha. I'll eat my badge if it's his Lordship that's doing this." Filcher shook his head. "No. Pascal is smarter than that." "Pascal?" "My nickname for the one pulling strings. Lady Connolly and her army at Selkirk's have their own mad-man named Fibonacci, supposed to be a genius manipulator and planner. Since we're being pulled in a different direction, I just put a name to the Devil. Another mathematician with a pattern." "Clever." "Not really, Boomer thought of the idea. I just stole it from him. Pascal might not even exist." "Then why name him?" "It helps me." Filcher said, getting up. "I give the source of my woe a name, it allows me to think of him as a person, and if I think of him as a person I can then indulge in another thing that helps me sleep at night." "What?" "Beating Pascal's face into a bloody pulp." He smiled and nodded at the woman. "Send me or the STD a message as soon as you get any news yourself. Good night, Miss Milton." "Elaine, please. May you hold The City and Her Law, Detective Inspector Filcher." She was quoting an old saying that her family had repeated during the Rise. If you couldn't believe in God, People, Family, or Yourself...hold to those two things. They at least were there to grab onto. It was mindless rhetoric, shouted by Ceasar Cartwright when he was rallying his forces during the Rise, keeping the city together...but it worked. The Miltons had moved onto different areas of Civil Service, but in their core, they were still part of that crowd listening to the short man in the oil-slick coat scream at them, forcing people to keep St. Louis and Order together by sheer force of will. It was good that Filcher stopped being 'Cartwright' when he had been made a DI. If his paranoid rambling about 'Pascal' was right, then to have any other will commanding the Cartwright legacy would be a sin. Filcher laughed and nodded. "For the City and Her Law. Always. And it's Ambrose."